CSU trustees approve policy allowing students to vote on “success fees”

The California State University Board of Trustees on Wednesday, Jan. 28, approved a requirement that allows students to vote on changes to “success fees.”

Trustees unanimously approved the new policy on Wednesday, which requires that future success fees are approved by the CSU chancellor, campus president and students. Further input will also be allowed in regard to how much the fee will cost and how the money is spent.

Student success fees apply to 12 of 23 California State University (CSU) campuses and constitute 21 percent of the total campus mandatory fees, excluding tuition, Long Beach Press-Telegram reported. At Cal State Dominguez Hills, the fee is $35; at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, that number is $780.

“These steps insure that the adoption of campus-based student success fees truly reflect the will of the students paying these fees,” CSU Chancellor Timothy White said at the trustee meeting in Long Beach.

Students are now able to rescind any new fees six years after they were implemented; current success fees will remain and will be eligible for reconsideration in 2021.

Additionally, campuses with these fees are required to report online how the money is allocated every year by Oct. 15. The data will be available to the public and Chancellor’s Office.

Unlike the University of California system, which has approved a tuition hike of up to 5 percent throughout the next five years, the CSU has no plans to raise tuition. The success fees have been a way to gather revenue for various services, such as hiring faculty and adding course sections.

Students, however, say the fees are disguised as a way to circumvent a CSU tuition hike freeze that was implemented in 2012. They also objected their lack of input on the matter, according to The Sacramento Bee.

The new policy has been met with varying reactions from students.

Cal State Fullerton senior Kayla Rodriguez told the Orange County Register she supports the new fee policy.

“It gives students more power to decide how to spend their education dollars,” she told the newspaper. “If I knew my fees would help keep the library open longer, then I’m more likely to support that.”

Robert DeWitz, a student at Cal State Dominguez Hills, has vocally opposed the fees at student trustee meetings, but said he was happy that student suggestions were implemented in the new guidelines, according to the Press-Telegram.

However, he is still against the fee.

“The student success fee is a microcosm in this overall trend to privatize higher education, to push the financial burden on our students, and that has long-reaching impacts on the economy in California,” he told the newspaper.

The student success fee began in 2008 and is mandatory for students to enroll and attend CSU campuses that require the fee.

In addition to the student success fees, trustees approved a $2-per-semester “student involvement and representation fee” to fund the California State Student Association (CSSA), which was also met with some negative responses.

Students may opt out of paying the fee, which would replace an appropriation from the Chancellor’s Office and voluntary contributions from campus student governments, according to The Sacramento Bee. If all CSU students, who number about 447,000, paid the fee each term, revenue would amount to nearly $1.8 million.

Many campus representatives encouraged the trustees to support the fee, which they say are directed toward legislative advocacy, leadership development and increasing student participation on campuses.

“It really puts the power back into the hands of individual students whether they choose to invest in their present and in their futures,” said student trustee Talar Alexanian, according to The Sacramento Bee.

But some students said the implementation of the fee did not have the same consultation and transparency as success fees.

Abigail Hudson, executive vice president of the campus student government at Fresno State, said during public comment that the campus suggests the CSSA approached students who would pay the fee instead of the board of trustees.

Another trustee, Steve Glazer, who served as student body president while he was at San Diego State University, said this new source of funds would allow CSSA to disconnect from campus organizations that have supported it in the past.

“I’m troubled with this proposal, not because of the amount, it’s a very small amount, but because of the precedent it would create in our system,” he told The Sacramento Bee.

(With reports from Long Beach Press-Telegram, Orange County Register and The Sacramento Bee)